Blocks, Stumps & Concrete.

Calgary HANDS Team:

Today was our heaviest work day to date, we started the morning with unloading in chain-gang fashion 500 cement blocks. We were not able to unload the blocks at our jobsite, as they would not be there if we hoped to see them the next day. We did unload them in to the church that is part of the Christian School. The church is a 2 min walk to the jobsite, it doesn't sound very far, but when the guys need to carry over 100lb cement bags they might disagree with you.

In the afternoon we cleared truckloads of garbage, fought and won the battle of removing a 100 year old tree. (the tree would of been a beautiful art piece in the middle of the classroom, but these rooms are tiny so we needed to remove it. Classroom size is 20' x 12'

We unloaded a second truck of 500 blocks & 5 yards of gravel. We took a brief break for a 40 cent drumstick (ice cream) and finished the day with our largest concrete pour. A HUGE thank you to the Niagara team for purchasing and leaving a cement mixer for us. We were able to finish pouring all of the grade beams.

We will return to the job site on Monday and begin building the walls with the blocks.

Tomorrow we are excited to go on a learning day, Saturday will be a cultural day, including zip lining =) Sunday we are attending church and spending the afternoon at the ocean.

We have all adapted well to the heat and are happy to report that we are healthy, the food is agreeing with us. We're loving the local food and might even be gaining a pound or two...

Comments:

well, um, we didn't have to carry bags of cement, but we did have to shovel a few centimeters of snow...

on behalf of us all, thanks for your work! Enjoy the beach!

Rose S

Feb 2, 2013 at 9:40 am

Looks like you all are working hard! It's wonderful to watch the progress on this project. Thank you so much for the updates!

Enjoy your days off. Ziplining is so much fun!!

Praying for you, the construction team and your hosts. God bless!

Theodore W.

Sep 15, 2017 at 8:29 pm

Wow, I can't believe that you had to carry 100lb bags of cement from the church all the way to the job site! I've worked with concrete before and that stuff can be a pain. I'm grateful for hard workers like yourselfs. http://www.boundarygardensupplies.com.au/products/Building-Stumps-p87549537